Out of 77 entries in the first round of the $36,000 CaptiveOne Advisors 1.45m Classic, nine found the path to a clear round. In the jump-off, there were five double clears, led by the fastest time of 37.26 seconds set by Ogomori on SIG Captain America, owned by SIG International Inc. Ogomori went seventh out of nine in the jump-off and was able to keep a blazing pace throughout the shortened course.

Second in the class went to Luiz Francisco de Azevedo (BRA) on Collin, owned by Santa Cecilia Stables. They were clear in 37.53 seconds, missing the top time by just 3/100ths of a second. Andrew Welles (USA) and Brindis Bogibo, owned by Itasca Group LLC, were third in 38.72 seconds with no faults.

Ogomori celebrated his first big win at WEF on Sunday. The young rider from Torrance, CA, trains with Canadian grand prix rider Chris Pratt, and this is his third year competing at WEF. He got into riding through his father Nobu Ogomori, who competed in show jumping and was a coach.

While Ogomori bought SIG Captain America as a five-year-old, he did not take over the ride until June of 2018.

“A German rider, Felix Hassmann, rode him for me for awhile,”explained Ogomori of the 12-year-old KWPN gelding by Captain Firex Collin L.“Last year was the first time that I rode him, building him up slowly from the 1.30m, 1.40m, until now.He’s great. He’s super careful, fast, really competitive,and has a good heart.”

Coming into the jump-off Ogomori changed his plan. “Chris [Pratt] mentioned that the first line had to be seven[strides]. The original plan was eight, but everybody was doing seven, so we changed the plan there. Then just go! Just gallop between the lines and make sure that the turn back to [fence] 10 was as tidy as possible.”

Ogomori gained his first championship experience in 2018 at the Asian Games in Jakarta, where he represented Japan and won the individual silver medal with SIG Iron Man. “Hopefully we can start qualifying for [the Tokyo Olympics],” he said.

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